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In First American TV Interview, Snowden Talks Accountability and Patriotism
mspohr (589790) points out NBC News's interview with Edward Snowden, the first time Snowden has talked with an American television reporter. It's a wide-ranging conversation, in which Snowden emphasizes his ongoing belief that he did the right thing to release the many documents that he did, even at the cost of his ability to travel. Snowden told NBC's Brian Williams "he had tried to go through channels before leaking documents to journalists, repeatedly raising objections inside the NSA, in writing, to its widespread use of surveillance. But he said he was told, "more or less, in bureaucratic language, 'You should stop asking questions.'" Two U.S. officials confirmed Wednesday that Snowden sent at least one email to the NSA's office of general counsel raising policy and legal questions." Perhaps paving the way to eventual repatriation, Snowden also indicated that he would be willing to accept a "short period" behind bars. But, he said, the U.S. should "reform the Espionage Act to distinguish between people who sell secrets to foreign governments for their own gain and people who return information to public hands for the purpose of serving the public interest," and to include contractors as well as government employees.
Between serving the public's interest, and serving one's own interest at the expense of the public? This is intended as a serious question--I like Snowden's idea, but how would we determine the difference between someone who's alerting us to government malfeasance, versus someone who's ideologically bent on disrupting government regardless of whether there's malfeasance or malevolent intent involved?
Here's to hot beer, cold women, and Glaswegian kisses for all.
The only place he'd ever get repatriated to is Leavenworth (if they're being generous) or Gitmo (if they aren't).
Poking the bear is bad enough, making the bear feel foolish (while continuing to poke) is unforgivable. In this case, the bear is not Russia. :(
If they let him go free, or off with a light sentence, he'll have a new career as a public speaker, or activist against the NSA and surveillance. No way the government would allow that sentiment to have a publicly acceptable mouth piece.
He has made no money in all this so how was it his own gain?
Otherwise he would have done it anonymously.
You play games. If he had done it anonymously you would say "what has he got to hide? He must be a foreign agent!"
Doing it anonymously didn't stop Bradley/Chelsea Manning from being prosecuted. Also, there's less plausibility for denial if there's someone is clearly an outspoken insider with verifiable access to privileged information.
Coming up front with all this requires guts and he should be respected. Hell, even Slashdot calls us anonymous 'cowards'.
http://www.ted.com/talks/edwar...
If Pandora's box is destined to be opened, *I* want to be the one to open it.
First, I'd like to say that he's a Patriot.
There were a lot of things he could have told you that he hasn't.
Second, if the US government would just follow the Constitution, specifically the Bill of Rights, and stop spying on American citizens in America without individual court orders for individual American citizens, and instead focus on the actual sources of terrorism that we all know are the source: Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Pakistan, and to a lesser extent Afghanistan, this would all go away.
That said, I look forward to him being granted Amnesty by a free and independent 100 percent green energy Scotland soon.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
2) Snowden revealed information about USA spying
3) Snowden claimed it was in violation of US Constitution.
4) As a result of Snowden's revelations, US collection has gone down. But there has been no terrorist event since then, so no one possibly have died because of his actions.
5) US claims that because collection is down, Snowden damaged US security. Snowden claims that because no one died, he did not.
6)Previously people objected within the US spying agencies about their actions - Snowden was not the first. No one in the agencies ever did anything about the complaints.
If you believe the US did wrong, then Snowden is a patriot. If you believe the US did no wrong, then Snowden is a traitor.
Opinions: from here on out. But honestly, this is a question not of action, but of political belief.
Most importantly, the people in the espionage agency SHOULD be more paranoid than the general population. Otherwise they are in the wrong job. That also means they need to deal with the fact that the general population will NOT want and should NOT allow them to do everything they deem necessary for a safe country. I can make the world safe for children by locking all the children up in a cage till they turn 18. But we don't do that because life is worth the risk. Similarly, we should NOT be giving any spy agencies all the power they think they need. And when we catch them going overboard, they need to be reigned back in.
All of which means that Snowden should be given the benefit of the doubt
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
Establishing the source establishes the credibility of the documents, and is necessary to prove that the information was obtained from someone with the necessary clearance and access. Going public is putting yourself at mortal risk, if not from the government whose secrets you are exposing, then from the random "patriots" who believe in that government. When working with information of this sort, keeping yourself anonymous is of benefit to your life expectancy, and thus is generally the preferred route. Suggesting that going public means he's doing it for his own gain is to ignore the fact that the drawbacks of identifying oneself as the source FAR outweigh the gains to be had.
and lost his home in the process
and became a tool for international politics
and doesn't have a country he belongs to
Ed basically sarificed himself so that we become more than mere data clusters.
I hope some of you are reading this; the biggest responsibility in this terrible breach of human rights is on the ones who sold their expertise and soul to Uncle Sam for a bigger lawn. Your grandkids will grow up with the Big Brother.
His appearance on NBC Nightly News may have done more to damage US intelligence gathering than his other "revelations". It certainly was a gold mine for Russian propoganda producers.
Anonymous whistleblowers tend to have no credibility whatsoever. That's why he didn't hide his identity.
He might want the government to follow the constitution, but that doesn't mean he's a masochist or a martyr.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Setting up the infrastructure for a total surveillance state is simply beyond the pale. What Snowden has done is what any true American should have done. The machine that government is setting up must be stopped dead in its tracks while there is still time, or there will be no stopping it. And there will be no United States of America after that, only a spot on the map infringing a trademark. Snowden is a true patriot.
If King George had had the NSA, you'd all be speaking proper English.
quiquid id est, timeo puellas et oscula dantes.
Snowden is going to be the first person in human history to have a suspicious death at the age of one-hundred and five.
There's a big difference between what these agencies do under cover of darkness, and what they do under the glare of a public spotlight. Solzhenitsyn returned to Russia after two decades in exile, whereupon he continued to criticise his homeland for another fourteen years, before dying of heart failure under suspicious circumstances at age eighty-nine.
There's a good reason they get mighty twisted about having their darkness aired: no more summary judgement, no more page 13 obituaries of A-list adversaries.
Hurricane Lolita:
No, Snowden's exile is something different: a life not envied, not one little bit. That much his button-down steampunk adversaries can manage under the broad light of day.
Because when the government has proven it has subverted the constitution, that clearly means they will suddenly decide to play by the rules when called out on it, right? Or...you could stop being a dope and realize that the government is out of control and above the law. Rather than act in the best interest of the people it is supposed to govern, it has instead been acting in its own interest and pushing through with a powergrab even harder now that it doesn't even need to hide it.
Stop listening to their lies and stop believing they are going to protect you.
Re 'decide his fate by staying in the US and facing the judicial system ? "
At best he would have found some political interest in his case.
He would have faced a sealed court as just a 'contractor' as the gov aspect of his NSA and CIA work would have been carefully hidden.
A 'contractor' may face all the same legal charges as a gov worker but enjoy few of the gov worker only whistleblowers legal protections.
He would have had all the legal protections of a contractor before a sealed court with a very expensive short list of cleared lawyers.
His legal team would not have the clearance to see, question or ask for more evidence that would support his case.
His legal team would not have the clearance to present more facts to any interested cleared political supporter.
After a short, rigged hidden trial the very public spin would begin.
The left of the US main stream media would understand he was a low level private contractor and not worth reporting on.
The right of the US main stream media would understand he was a low level contractor with far left union ideals and not worth reporting on.
For anyone else the hint that he was a limited hangout would make sure they lost interested in the few public fragments of the case.
Knowing what happens to even the most politically powerfully supported US gov whistleblowers within the US legal system the only wise option was to get the information to the press and then be free of the material.
You can more read about other past US whistleblowers and their US court experiences here: http://cryptome.org/2013-info/...
The other good aspect is that great law reform teams can now work with the public information in public courts and slowly bring more media attention to the loss of US rights and freedoms over the past decades.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
I think you're begging the question. His whole point was that the government which would like to prosecute him does not follow the Constitution. Case in point, prisoners in Gitmo, or the CIA's torture victims.
Because these kinds of cases get heard in special kangaroo courts where you don't get a fair trial by jury and the documents are all inadmissible even though they have been published in the NY Times.
Absolutely. Well said!
Because he believes in the constitution, but not in the government's willingness to uphold it.
The politicos want his head on a pike... God help help him because I don't see anyone of consequence standing up for the man.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
But you don't know that he lied about this. It may have been the case that he, as he said, mentioned this to higher ups in one form or another on multiple occasions and was told to shut up. It's not as though the NSA documents every single CONVERSATION its employees have while working. Snowden was under no obligation to actually document when he had these conversations or what they consisted of.
http://www.sfgate.com/nation/a...
Even if the court is a kangaroo court, civil disobedience requires standing trial -- you expose the illegitimacy of the system by showing people the system is rigged. Thoreau stood trial, Martin Luther King did, cripes even Hitler stood trial a the critical point in his career, it demonstrates that you do not consider yourself above the reach of a system that can affect all of us: Snowden accepts the possibility of Gitmo because, in principle, all of us could be sent to Gitmo and taking a Get-out-of-Gitmo-Free card would be unfair.
That's if he believed in reform, but I don't think he does.
Don't blame me, I voted for Baltar.
CONVERSATION
His claim is that these "repeated" "objections" were "in writing". If you're not going to read the story then at least read the damn summary.
The master whistle blower conducted an internal fight with NSA superiors IN WRITING and kept no copies? You'd have to paddle waaay up Fanboi River to buy that.
So now that your one peg has been kicked out, what have you got left? The single email question about the legal force of EOs? That leaves you with the "repeated" and "objection" claims to cope with.
Face it. He's lying.
Snowden released the information, and now it's up to us to fix the problems. You mention MLK and such, but the situation simply isn't comparable, and even if it was, there is no need for every 'hero' to act in the same way.
And why is there so much focus on Snowden himself? It seems like the government is trying to distract people from their horrendous activities.
Snowden accepts the possibility of Gitmo because, in principle, all of us could be sent to Gitmo and taking a Get-out-of-Gitmo-Free card would be unfair.
I don't think it's unfair for people who don't want to be abused by their government to move elsewhere.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Well he broke a lot of laws, and he revealed a lot of government activity that wasn't horrendous, along with the horrendous stuff. Just about everything him and Greenwald disclose now are things that are completely legal for the US to do.
That blames the victim -- the government doesn't have to change, the people should just "love it or leave it." I think you're basically coming at it from his perspective though, he clearly despises nation-states and institutions of any kind, and thinks everyone should be as "principled" as him and free agent themselves to "free" countries like Russia (the herpaderp from him on this issue is particularly extraordinary ).
Don't blame me, I voted for Baltar.
Well he broke a lot of laws, and he revealed a lot of government activity that wasn't horrendous, along with the horrendous stuff. Just about everything him and Greenwald disclose now are things that are completely legal for the US to do.
Legal != moral. I, for one, want to know what my dear little government thugs are doing, legal or not. If these things are legal, perhaps that needs to be changed. Releasing information like this puts the issues into the spotlight.
That blames the victim -- the government doesn't have to change, the people should just "love it or leave it."
Straw man. Leaving or not leaving is a personal decision. You can either leave to avoid the abuse, or stay and work to change it (or stay and do nothing, as some do).
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Come to think of it, if the US government wants to talk to Snowden or Assange so bad, can't they just do so by teleconference?
Liberty - Security - Laziness - Pick any two.
He's been very busy practicing it, so maybe he's out of breath for that.
Liberty - Security - Laziness - Pick any two.
The net result of this whole affair is the US and its immediate allies lose all of their intelligence programs
Perhaps they should have thought that through before doing all this nonsense?
I don't think you really care either, since these are "thugs" you clearly feel no responsibility for, you probably just get a little righteous indignation high out of seeing the government embarrassed, kinda like Snowden.
Well, you might want to stop theorizing about how I think unless you're a mind reader.
I vote against these scumbags at every opportunity and vote for people who will set the situation right. It's just that idiots make up the majority, and they have not yet come around.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
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... civil disobedience requires standing trial
No it doesn't. It just requires being disobedient. Now if you want to argue that martyrdom like that is more effective, feel free, but don't pretend that there's a rule book for standing up to government abuse.
Besides, I'm pretty sure that if Snowden met every requirement you could create for 'reform', you'd still find a way to discount him.
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Snowden, You stood up and did what was right even at the cost of your own freedom and safety. You'll probably die in jail or or with a CIA goon's icepick in your kidney, but thanks for what you've done. We've become a nation of pussies who won't stand up for much and barely know what our rights are let alone display any courage to lift a finger to protect them. The loss of liberty is worse than the threat of terror. I hope to god we realize that as a nation and stop pissing on the rights our nations founders would have died to protect. I only wish anyone with any political clout or media presence would actually go on record, get loud and take a stand and acknowledge that Snowden is a whistle-blower not traitor and that it is not OK for us all to sit passively in silence while our hard won civil liberties are washed away.
I continue in my belief that Civics should be taught every year from 8th grade through 12th grade.
I'd take this a step further and require that juries be picked only from 12th graders and retirees. That way, no one can complain about missing work. You may think it's a bad idea to use teens and the elderly, but I think they may actually do a better job than a bunch of people who don't want to be there in the first place.
---
DRM is like antifreeze, to the MPAA/RIAA it's sweet, to the consumers it's poison.
What would be the point of copies? You'd just then shout, "They're obviously faaaaaake!"
Don't just stand there, get that other dog!
Mr. Snowden exposed, in an undeniable manner, a grave threat to the freedom of each and every US citizen. He deserves a Presidential pardon or some kind of get out of jail free card on this act, because he did break the law, but the law in this case is shielding people who are secretly undermining our fundamental freedoms through massive unwarranted spying on US citizens.
Is Snowden a criminal? Yes. Is he a hero to those of us who wish to continue to live in the land of the freer than average? Yes.
Here's what our government has been doing since 9/11/2001 gave the anti-freedom brigade carte blanche:
1. As Mr. Snowden rubs our face in it: massive and sweeping unwarranted surveillance and collection of data and meta data of our phone and internet communications,
2. Secret courts.
3. Extra-judicial assassinations of both foreign nationals and in rare cases, US citizens. 4. Drone strikes on people in many countries outside of our declared war zones (Iraq and Afghanistan).
5. Declaring war on a country that has not invaded us or attacked us or any of our allies (Iraq).
6. Detaining criminals without due process, no sentence, no release date.
7. Torture on a massive scale. Abu Ghraib is just where we got caught on film. We've funded the torture of thousands of individuals. We as taxpayers are complicit and accruing a pretty massive karmic debt.
8. CIA black sites where our government can and does operate outside any bounds of law or moral constraint.
Since 9/11, we have been sliding into a nasty democracy of evil and unconstrained government behavior. We need to start rolling this stuff back. Strike down the patriot act and adopt a pre-9/11 stance towards freedom, due process, privacy and the constitution. It'd be a bargain to suffer a dozen 9/11 attacks, compared to what we're becoming because of our craven fear.
Live free or die.
For every US government (usually but not exclusive to right-wing) official who cries out "Traitor", the truth gets hidden that the US government really did break the US constitution (perhaps not just this one, there are stories that there were telegraph offices that went through army posts that had pony express to the White House). But more recently there was a very troubling story published by the New Yorker (and it may still be online) about Thomas Drake (inventor of a haystack-to-needle data search tool), who worked for the NSA and in the process of designing thin thread incorporated checks and balances for it to remain constitutional. First the NSA went with another project (Trailblazer) that failed, then they turned around, stabbed him in the back, removed the checks and balances and when he tried to keep things on the up and up (respecting the constitution and his oath), he was thrown under the bus by the NSA, his home was bugged, his family threatened, he was threatened with 1000 years in prison, and basically accused of being unAmerican. Short answer: being on the inside and trying to do the right thing will get you poo-pooed. If you try hard, you will be given the smackdown. The people in power aren't interested in the constitution. They aren't interested in doing the right thing. They don't even care about the 'enemy'. They care about the power that they have, and they like it unchecked, unbridled, and if throwing boy scouts like Snowden, Drake, Manning or Asange under the bus get them more power, they will throw.
Snowden did not engage in civil disobedience in the vein of Gandhi/MLK/Thoreau. But that's fine. Civil disobedience is just one type of civil resistance. Civil disobedience only works against petty laws with limited punishment.
In this case, the legal consequences were dire. Can you name any act of civil disobedience (submitting oneself willingly to punishment as an act of disobedience) that carried the maximum possible punishment of death or life in prison? Gandhi, MLK and Thoreau broke laws where the punishment was just a few days/weeks/months. I am sure Snowden would gladly accept such a punishment if that was the choice, since the current alternative is to spend his whole life, in fear, in a foreign country.
What he did was different. He broke a law with dire repercussions in his attempt to expose constitutional violations. What you are suggesting is closer to telling the members of the White Rose Movement to willingly expose themselves to the law. Yes, I know: Godwin. A better US example would be demanding the FBI burglars to submit themselves to law. I happen to think the burglars did the right thing by not submitting themselves to the law then. Do you? How do you see Snowden as different from them?
Unlike the burglars, Snowden could not keep himself anonymous after the leak, since the NSA, unlike the case with the FBI burglary (since the burglars were completely unrelated to the FBI), would have quickly identified him. They sent someone to his house, almost immediately after the leak. So he had to run and go public. And if he ran to the only places that can resist US extradition, without going public as he did, he would have been easily labelled a spy. Going public made that charge not stick with most people. I believe that Snowden, once having chosen to expose the constitutional violations, had no real choices other than the ones he exercised.
This reminds of prison break. The public can see the trial but the government has a secret trial of their own in which the decisions are one-sided. I feel bad for the guy he was working for the public interest that even cost him his ability to travel plus he is under a trial with obvious results of him being shipped to some Guantanamo, Gitmo or whatever.
How can Mr. Snowden be not right when we are not yet ready put each and every action of our government (including security agencies) to a "democratic test"?
We do know. He dumped the documents with journalists quite a few months ago then fled the country.
If he had done it anonymously, all the journalists who accepted the documents would be under extreme pressure to reveal who it was, likely to the point some of them would be jailed and prosecuted. Snowden saved them that trouble, so we could all focus on the documents and not on punishing the messengers.
Is Snowden in the same class as these patriots?
> Like Edward Snowden, Benjamin Franklin Was Called a Traitor For Informing the People About the Actions of its Government
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2013/10/like-edward-snowden-benjamin-franklin-was-called-a-traitor-for-informing-the-people-about-the-actions-of-its-government.html
> Pentagon Papers Leaker Daniel Ellsberg Praises Snowden, Manning
http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2013/08/03/208602113/pentagon-papers-leaker-daniel-ellsberg-praises-snowden-manning
The net result of this whole affair is the US and its immediate allies lose all of their intelligence programs, while Russia gets to keep doing whatever it wants.
Ah so the essense is that the US should not be a free country where the government sticks to the morally justified law bacause of Russia?
oooookay.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
Nobody is going to lose a war from what Snowden leaked so please stop acting like a walking penis.
That goalpost shift sounds like a rather stupid definition to me since it means just being doomed lemmings when there are not enough people in power to care about fixing a corrupt system. I think you'd be better off discussing things seriously and honestly instead of making up such odd things to try to fill a gap in an argument.
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that was the headline on CNBC i saw yesterday, and it got me ticked off. id just like to point out that as is so often the case, the media is trying to steer the dialogue and mentality with a false-choice. The two words are not appropriate in my mind. He *is* a traitor, but to a lying deceptive system. But he is also a HERO for it. as far as patriot - that depends on what you believe the fundamental nature of our system is at it's core - right or wrong. Frankly, that to me is just semantics and jingoism. im more concerned with whether he acted in the interests of LIBERTY, which in this day and age, seem to have less and less to do with patriotism (and often appear at the other side of the table).
Snowden also indicated that he would be willing to accept a "short period" behind bars.
How much time behind bars do those that break the "supreme law of the land" get?
Yes it is hard to fight with government but if you are right, you have a good possibility of clearing your name
Funny. You're a funny guy.
Convicted and then given clemency by a close friend. Simple wasn't it? Why pretend otherwise? Why pretend I'm not keeping up? Your motivation is a bit more interesting here than something everyone knows but you deny.
Strawman. Obviously everything said can be applied to everybody around the world; however, the bill of rights does NOT give you rights. You have alienable rights as a human being... does that remind you of something?? oh, the mission statement of the founders...
They also state clearly that you have rights NOT listed in the document; their omission in no way concluding you do not have those rights. Nearly every amendment is phrased clearly as a limitation upon government infringing upon your rights; which you always have, and by imposing those enumerated government limits shall not be infringed upon. The courts and the people guide the direction and if the reps function, they eventually make the more permanent limitations; such as the civil rights movement's amendment.
The document does not define that government's limitations ONLY exist within it's borders. That is the false reasoning being used today when Obama kills Americans in another country; I'm stretching a little but it's still relevant. They use the wartime crap as an exception because obviously, you can't give Nazi their rights and follow the process with any chance to survive war with them. We are not at war with the planet so that excuse can't be used (but they are.) War almost by definition is the lack of laws, rules, civility so despite us having limits on it; those are not because we are civil or the game has rules; it's a practical matter for survival, actual and political. (Politics and war doesn't have much logic to it; it's a human thing.)
Democracy Now! - uncensored, anti-establishment news
I hate to say... but that's a pretty naïve view of post-9/11 America. Nothing takes precedence over national security. And who determines what "national security" is? The very elevated people who abandoned the Constitution in the name of national security. In other words, one has to "prove" something the game controllers don't want proven. And in a nation whose population is also preoccupied with their own safety and are willing to put complete trust in their government, what chance does someone like Snowden have? Even Daniel Ellsberg recently publicly stated that Snowden did the right thing. And from a practically point if view I'd have to agree. When Kerry can go on public TV (a number of times) and adjudicate Snowden as a "traitor and coward" and the hawks in government can essentially so the same, when the forces of government have come together to orchestrate a PR campaign poisoning public opinion, what kind of fair and public trial could there possibly be? Even Ellsberg asserted there would be tons of information relevant to a trial that would never be heard because they are classified state secrets. Snowden did what any person of conscience would've done these days when faced with such insurmountable opposition in an era of secrecy superseding if not the letter if the law then the spirit of the law (Constitutional law anyway).
"Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities." - Voltaire
My comment was about what happened after he was convicted.
Clemency is why he didn't do time.
Your pretended misunderstanding of this is depressing with what appears to be boilerplate questioning and insinuations that have nothing at all to do with what I wrote (eg. "That you know things that nobody else" - you've wandered into tinfoil hat territory sunshine and I find that incredibly insulting.)